


Let Me Tell You Goodbye

by nagi_schwarz



Series: Read My Lips [5]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-19
Updated: 2016-03-19
Packaged: 2018-05-27 17:19:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 966
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6293116
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nagi_schwarz/pseuds/nagi_schwarz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the comment_fic prompt: Any, Any, <i>So remember goodbye / Doesn’t mean forever / Let me tell you goodbye / Doesn’t mean we’ll never be together again.</i> How John lost his hearing, and why he won't speak even though he has a voice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Let Me Tell You Goodbye

John came awake slowly, dazed, confused. Everything was dim and hazy, like the lights were broken and flickering. Why were the lights flickering?  
  
"Mom," he mumbled. "Mom, what's going on?"  
  
And then he remembered. The party. His band had been rockin' it, he'd totally nailed that solo, and then stupid Peter and his stupid friends had broken out the keg, and someone else had called the cops, and it was over.  
  
He'd called Mom, because Dad would have screamed at him all the way home, and it wasn't his fault. It wasn't supposed to be one of the kegger parties. It was his first real gig, and even if it had ended badly, he wanted to savor that.  
  
Mom wouldn't yell at him; she'd understand. And she'd looked disappointed when she pulled up at the house and police cars were scattered out front, lights flashing. After she checked his breath and made him do his own field sobriety test - which the cops laughed at and made him blush - she pulled him in for one of her warm hugs and told him to climb inside, she'd take him home, she'd explain to Dad.  
  
The awkward silence only lasted for a couple of minutes before Mom asked how the gig went, and John told her how he was totally rocking the solo on Ring of Fire, and she smiled at him.  
  
And then there was a screech of tires and a crunch of metal and a waterfall of glass, and the world went black.  
  
Car crash.  
  
John struggled to sit upright. "Mom!" He couldn't move. Was he stuck in the seatbelt? Was the car crushed in on him? Would firemen have to use the jaws of life?  
  
There was a sharp pain in his right wrist. He turned to the right, frowned – and saw that his right hand was handcuffed to a massive metal pipe.  
  
Confusion ricocheted down his spine. What? A pipe? But they were in a car crash. Why wasn't he in the car? He used his left hand to pull himself upright, lean against the pipe, and then he got a good look at his surroundings. He was in a cement basement. A naked lightbulb swung overhead, the source of the flickering. Wooden pallets were stacked in another corner. There was a furnace, lots of pipes.  
  
The floor was hard and cold.  
  
"John, are you all right?"  
  
Mom was chained to the radiator on the far side of the room.  
  
His confusion turned to panic. "Mom, what's going on?" Blood was trickling sluggishly from a cut on her hairline.  
  
"We've been kidnapped," she said, her voice low and tight. "They're holding us for ransom. But John – I've seen their faces. Even if your father pays, I don't think they'll give us back."  
  
John's heart pounded. "Mom, what do we do?"  
  
"You need to get out of here," Mom said. "Go for help."  
  
"I'll take you with me," he said.  
  
"No. If I stay behind, distract them, you'll have a chance to get away. Do you understand?"  
  
He did, but she was talking crazy. "Mom, no. You have to come with me."  
  
"No, John. I need you to go." Her expression was calm, collected.  
  
"But how?"  
  
"I need you to be brave, John. Be strong. Now listen to me, and do everything I say."  
  
"No, Mama. Please."  
  
When he called her _Mama_ , her composure wavered. "John, do as I say."  
  
He opened his mouth to beg her to let him stay, or for her to come with him, but her gaze hardened, and she began to tell him in that low, controlled voice what to do.  
  
And he obeyed. His world went wobbly and gray around the edges with the pain, but he did it, gnawed on his own wrist till it bled and bled and bled (and no one would ever know what was beneath the black wristband he wore from there on out), and then he used the blood to make his hand slippery. He had to dislocate his own thumb to get out out of the handcuffs even with the blood, and for one second he was terrified he would never play music again.

Mom pointed to the window. He could climb out of it easy, he was sure. He didn't care. He ran to her side.  
  
"Mom, do you have a hair pin? Or did you see where the keep the keys?"  
  
Footsteps thundered overhead.  
  
"Go, John," she hissed, shoving at him, but he tugged at her handcuffs.  
  
"John," she whispered. "I love you. Now go."  
  
"Mama –"  
  
"This isn't goodbye, I promise." She shoved at him again, more forcefully. "You know the rules. Goodbye isn't forever. Goodbye means I'll see you when we're older, remember?"  
  
His right arm was numb from the elbow down. His knees were shaking. He couldn't do it. He couldn't leave her.  
  
The footsteps were louder.  
  
"Go now!" Mom screamed.  
  
The door at the top of the stairs flew open.  
  
John scrambled up toward the window. He had to shove against it with his left hand to get it open, and then he was crawling through as best as he could, but the opening was so small, and it felt like he'd peeled the entire left side of his body.  
  
A hand closed over his ankle, and his heart stopped.  
  
The last thing he ever heard was his mother screaming his name, and his own voice screaming for her, and then two gunshots, and the world went black once more.  
  
John woke in the hospital two days later, and there were people crowded around him, doctors and nurses and his father and brother, and their lips were moving, but none of them were talking, and all he could hear was his own voice screaming and screaming and screaming.


End file.
